Watching Television in a Love Motel

In this unforgettable first book of poetry by Haro Lee, television - like love - binds us, liberates us; inspires, infuriates and illuminates us.

Watching Television in a Love Motel is a poetic chronicle of Haro's time in Aotearoa, South Korea and the United States of America. In four parts - 'Daytime Television' , 'Primetime Television' , 'Late Night Television' , and 'Graveyard Slot' - she looks at her past, family and self with the help of the unwavering cultural force that is TV.

Big subjects are caught in its glow: God, drugs, love, anti-motherhood, intergenerational trauma, loneliness, failure, and 3am existential anxiety. The final section is a love letter to a dying neighbourhood in Seoul. Set against the heartache of a rapidly developing nation, this is the story of one girl and her life with a beloved grandmother.